May 17, 2003	Saturday	Rabi-ul-Awwal 14, 1424

WASHINGTON, May 16: Alarmed by a huge increase in intercepted communications indicating that Al Qaeda-related terrorist attacks may be imminent, the United States, Australia and Britain have issued a flurry of terrorism warnings in recent days.

Other nations — such as Germany and Denmark — have followed suit.

The fears have been made all the more real by Monday’s triple suicide bombings in Saudi Arabia which killed 34 people at compounds housing western nationals, officials say.

“There has been a definite increase in chatter over the past couple of weeks,” said one US official, referring to intercepted telephone and e-mail conversations and interrogations of terror suspects by intelligence agencies.

“We are very concerned about possible attacks,” a second US official said.

The officials said the intercepts were coming not only from suspected Al Qaeda operatives but also from people believed to be affiliated with the network who either operate on their own or as part of a group that shares Osama bin Laden’s anti-West agenda.

The latest warden notice — issued late Thursday by the US consulate in Jeddah, Saudia Arabia — warned of an unverified but specific threat against the al-Hamra neighbourhood in the Red Sea port city.

Later on Friday, the British Foreign Office said there was a “clear terrorist threat” in Djibouti, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Somalia, Tanzania and Uganda, a day after it suspended all commercial flights to Kenya.

The flight suspension after the State Department warned of terrorist attacks in East Africa generally and Kenya specifically.

Kenyan authorities called the move “extreme” but said they had information that a man indicted for the 1998 bombings of the US embassies in Nairobi and Dar es Salaam that killed 235 is at large and plotting an attack.

Australia on Thursday boosted its travel warnings for countries throughout Southeast Asia — Thailand, the Philippines, Malaysia, East Timor, Singapore and Brunei — saying the perpetrators of last year’s bombing on the Indonesian resort island of Bali retained the ability to stage further attacks.

Canberra’s move came after Washington on Wednesday issued a new terror alert for Malaysia, particularly the state of Sabah, where it said members of the banned group Jemaah Islamiyah (JI) were still active.

Australia issued an updated alert for Indonesia on Wednesday.—AFP